BOLSTERING HEALTH CARE?

A proposal to garner extra tax revenues to bolster our troubled Health
Care System. Government tax revenues from 'sanctioned lotteries', or
outright gambling casinos like Rama, constitute a well thought out
plan to generate extra monies without rubbing the populace the wrong
way.

The idea for this new revenue stream probably started rolling in Las
Vegas, Nevada, in the middle 1900s, and has now become a major source
of government revenues in Canada.

The new revenue stream is not unlike the implementation of income
taxes, early in the last century, or the introduction of a VAT tax by
Brian Mulroney in the not too distant past I might add.

So what does a cash-strapped government do for an encore?

Ok, firstly we have taxed what you own; secondly, we have taxed what
you earn, thirdly, we have encouraged a somewhat 'minor vice' you may
possess and have taxed that too; and finally, we have imposed a value
added tax on the necessities of life that you 'buy legitimately' on a
daily basis.

Now where do we go? We need more.

Well, we are now working on a potential revenue stream in the form of
a tax on purchases that you may presently make 'illegitimately'. The
problem with this undertaking is that potential government revenues in
this new endeavor must come from the 'sale of the product' and not
from a tax imposed thereon. In other words, we are looking at the
possibility of growing marijuana in controlled government settings and
selling it through our provincially owned LCBO outlets across Ontario.
We have finally reasoned that the sale of marijuana is actually no
different from our present sale of intoxicating beverages and many of
your elected representatives are daily users of this banned substance
anyway.

The upside of this venture would be the elimination of hundreds of
illegal grow houses across Ontario, reduce the number of people
clogging our courts, free up a lot of space in our jails, save Ontario
Hydro millions of dollars in stolen electricity costs, curtail the
need for extra law enforcement officers, keep the pushers off the
streets and out of our schools, provide badly needed revenues for our
health care system, and generally clean up crime generated by the
present covert sale of this rather harmless product.

The monies generated from this undertaking would allow Ontario to
embark on a mission to provide the ultimate in health care for all our
citizens.

And fortunately, the downside of this venture would only be
experienced by grow house operators, pushers, and lawyers.

Clifford A Beagan